Goa'uld
One of the Milky Way Galaxy's most dominant species thousands of years, the Goa'uld are serpent parasites that forcibly take human hosts, and possess a thirst for power and worship. They have enslaved countless worlds, using their inhabitants as hosts, soldiers, miners, and personal slaves. Biology and Development The symbiotic creatures are birthed from asexual mothers, Goa'uld queens. In the process every newborn symbiote inherits the genetic memory of the one before it. It is approximately a decade after their creation before the Goa'uld are capable of being anything more than helpless, squealing snakes. They must be fed a steady electrical current in an aquatic container or incubated in pouches created in the abdomens of Jaffa, slave warriors in the service of the Goa'uld, to stay alive. After maturing, a symbiote is ready to take a host. Physiologically, the Goa'uld differ somewhat from symbiote to symbiote. Younger Goa'uld tend to be far whiter with twin black eyes. The older and more mature, the more gray or green the serpents tend to be. The majority of the species has four bright eyes and short fins to propel them in an aquatic environment. More mature symbiotes are capable of jumping significant distances, despite their form. Utilizing their powerful, four-pronged jaws, they burrow through the back of the neck (or through the soft tissue at the back of the mouth), wrapping themselves around the victim's upper spinal column and into the brain. Instantaneously the Goa'uld has control of the physical body, suppressing the original individual's consciousness. Goa'uld symbiotes have incredible regenerative abilities and, with the aid of a sarcophagus, they are capable of living thousands of years in the body of a human host. Once a Goa'uld is old enough to begin utilizing its healing abilities, it is implanted within the incubating pouch of a Jaffa in a ceremony known as the prim'tah. (During the period the Goa'uld is within a Jaffa, the term "prim'tah" can also refer to the infant symbiote itself.) The Goa'uld and its Jaffa are unable to communicate by conventional means, unless the Jaffa is in a deep state of kelnorim meditation. On this level of the subconscious, the Goa'uld receives vital information necessary to repair most illnesses. History The origins of the Goa'uld lie on the planet designated P3X-888. Long ago the Goa'uld learned how to infest and possess the Unas, another species native to that world, and learned to operate the Stargate on their planet and leave. For an untold number of years the species was supposedly a dying race, unable to find hosts for their serpent form to exist within -- until a few thousand years ago, when the Supreme System Lord Ra, in a desperate pilgrimage through space to uncover his species' salvation, stumbled upon a planet of primitive humans: Earth. Raharvested among the primitives and took the body of a young boy, seeding the rest upon different worlds in the galaxy as slave laborers. The Goa'uld created Jaffa to serve them, whom the Goa'uld queens transformed from normal humans. The Jaffa became incubators for the larvae form as well as serving as the army for their entire populations -- greatly increasing the symbiote's chances of surviving and successfully taking over a human host. It is even possible that the Goa'uld occupied Earth in ancient times, posing as the gods and goddesses of various civilizations. Culture The Goa'uld society was feudal in nature. Their hierarchy was governed by the System Lords, a few dozen of the most powerful Goa'uld who were usually warring with one another for worlds and resources. Despite their cruelty, there were several rules that most strictly follow. For instance, it was forbidden for two Goa'uld, within their host bodies, to sexually produce a child. The human child, called a Harcesis, possessed the Goa'uld genetic memory and was thus a great security risk. The Goa'uld were opposed by the Tok'ra, a rebel subset of the species who, by nature of personal choice, differed from them on a philosophical level. The Tok'ra choose to co-exist with willing hosts, rather than take them by force. The term "Goa'uld" is loosely used in that it is often mistaken as the primary definition of a symbiote; but the Tok'ra, who possess genetically identical creatures within, refuse to be known by the term "Goa'uld," believing it should only be used to define any symbiote demanding power and worship for themselves. Without the Jaffa the Goa'uld were nothing more than parasites. To remain in control of the planets they conquered, the Goa'uld pose as various gods from Earth mythology, so that the masses (people whose ancestors were transplanted from Earth thousands of years ago) would follow and obey. Final Years During the final years of the last ruling dynasty, the Goa'uld began to show zero population growth, as the System Lords had literally been devouring symbiotes. Their desire for power and dominance, even over their Goa'uld brethren, was one of many reasons which led to their ultimate demise. A major blow for the race came with the rebellion of the Jaffa (Teal'c), who recognized the potential in the Tau'ri and chose to defect to them. Over the course of almost a decade Stargate Command and the Tok'ra worked to undermine Goa'uld authority. The Goa'uld, always overconfident, overestimated their chances. The ultimate turning point was the arrival of the Replicators in the Milky Way Galaxy. The Goa'uld, whose tactics were unsuccessful against the mechanical "scourge," quickly lost their domains to the machines. The Replicators were defeated by the Dakara super-weapon at Dakara, but by then the damage to their dominion had been all but complete. The System Lords had been defeated, the remaining Goa'uld retreated and freedom was finally in the hands of the Jaffa. Minor Goa'uld had to reevaluate their use in the new galactic landscape. The later arrival of the Ori provided them with a brief opportunity for a say, but ultimately this was not enough. Many Goa'uld now hide out on Earth in human beings responsible for governing many large firms and businesses, but are under the watchful eye of the N.I.D. Rebirth....Sometime after the end of the Ori Invasion the remaining Goa'uld baned together to form a new System Lord council. Under the reign of the Goa'uld Skratah a new order began to form. Scrapping together the remaining worlds, fleets, and armies they solidifed their hold on the small potrion of their once supreme empire. This short lived rebirth was cut short by the reemergence of the Goa'uld Atlas who had been considerd nothing but a myth from Goa'uld prehistory. Atlas's forces overran the System Lords and captured them aboard the summit station Heliopolis. Atlas advent and the fall of the System Lords ushered in the beginning of the "Fourth Dynasty" *Goa'uld List *System Lords *Goa'uld military units *Goa'uld Starship *Goa'uld Technology *Goa'uld Queen *Goa'uld Planet's *Goa'uld Empire Category:Goa'uld